Categories
air quality

DM601

Dienmern DM601 is a portable air quality monitor with two options available DM601A and DM601B. The difference is in additional HCHO sensors. Model DM601A has no HCHO sensor onboard.

The device has SHT30 temperature and humidity sensor but measures temperature wrongly due to device self-heating and poor thermal design (see thermal photos of DM601A). The battery is 3000 mAh that gives about 5 hours of both charging time and battery life (see details).

Most of the sensors inside DM601 are unbranded. No Wireless connectivity. Usability is average. Measurements (except temperature) are more or less ok.

Aliexpress price: 70$-100$

Categories
air quality

Air Mentor 2s

Multi-sensor (CO2, PM2.5, TVOC, HCHO) air quality monitor with Bluetooth and Wi-Fi.

Applications are available for iPhone, iPad, Android phones.

Air Mentor 2 iPad application

By its design Air Mentor is not a portable IoT device. It has no battery. It has no display. So it is an alternative to uHoo (and to some extent to Netatmo). If compare Air Mentor 2s to uHoo: Air Mentor 2s have HCHO sensor. But uHoo measures CO, O3, NO2, pressure instead. Netatmo is actually a weather station with an external t/RH sensor, that also measures air quality by CO2 parameter only. Air Mentor 2s got a more expensive CO2 and t/RH sensors than both Netatmo and uHoo.

Temperature and Humidity sensor (SHT30) is both good itself and placed correctly on the bottom of the device with some gap from the mainboard. More or less as it is recommended by the Sensirion guide.

There are some issues with the current versions of mobile applications. For example, you cannot connect the device to Wi-Fi access points using iOS devices (it works using the Android version). Russian localization is not complete. Trend data from cloud not always loading (for both iOS and Android).

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air quality

Hti HT-401 CO2 Meter

Hti HT-401 is the most portable CO2 meter I have. It is small and simple. It is only 75 mm in diameter and 25 mm in depth. Weight is 62 g. That is including 14250 (1/2AA) 300 mAh battery. Its only button is power. It count 30 seconds before actually show the CO2 level. And it automatically power off after 30 minutes.

HT-401 CO2 Meter

Four-digits LED display only shows CO2 level and 3 emoticons 🙂<600ppm 😐600-1200ppm 🙁>1200. That is it. No settings for emoticons limits. No setting for the power-off timer. Not display temperature and humidity, nor time and date. Just one sensor inside and that is well known SenseAir S8 LP. That provides correct readings. Changing the environments not impact accuracy. The device is relatively cheap (I bought it for about 75$ without battery on Aliexpress)

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USB meter

WITRN U2 USB Power meter

WEB-U2 or WITRN U2 is one of those advanced power meters with a big screen.

  • Both type-A and Type-C input/output.
  • Multiple display modes.
  • An external temperature sensor support.
  • The device has an auto screen rotation.
  • Fast charge protocols detection.
  • PC Software
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Categories
power bank

Power banks with MTK-PE

Since USB 2.0 became a standard for charging port there are a couple of things happens. Devices got more and more battery capacity and that is why many fast charging protocols appear to overcome USB 2.0 default 2.5W (5v 0.5A). Those protocols were necessary to keep the same charging time with larger batteries. Some of those protocols were part of USB standard (like USB Battery Charging and USB Power Delivery) and some were not (like Apple 2.4A, Qualcomm QuickCharge, Mediatek PumpExpress+, and a lot of others).

Most chargers and power banks support only some of those fast charging protocols. So usually you will not get the fastest posible charging for all of your devices from the same source. For example power banks with Mediatek PumpExpress support is exceptionally rare devices. There are a number of power banks with Qualcomm Quick Charge or USB Power Delivery available, but not with Mediatek PE+. So below is three 10000 mAh power banks I found with MTK-PE support.

Power BankInput, WQCPE+PDotherprice
Tqka KA05820W QC2.03.01.1–details14$
Unitechi UTI01PD20W QC2.03.02.03.0details40$
rock space P6518W QC2.03.02.02.0details20$

All fast charging protocols that can be detected by WITRN U2

Power bank/protocolTqka KA058Unitechi 01PDrock space P65
USB Power Delivery (18W)–PD3.0PD 2.0
Apple 5v, 2.4A+++
Samsung 5v, 2.0A+++
USB Battery Charge 5v, 1.5A+++
OPPO VOOC, DASH–––
VIVO Dual Flash 5v,9v,12v +++
QC2.0 5v,9v,12v+++
QC3.0+++
Samsung AFC, 9v+––
Huawei FCP 5v,9v,12v+++
Huawei SCP–––
Mediatek PumpExpress+PE+1.1PE+2.0PE+2.0

Tqka KA058 Apple 5v 2.4A

Categories
USB meter

Power-Z KM001C

Power-Z KM001C is USB Type-C tester from ChargerLAB. Nice and slim. With OLED display. With good PC Software. Have similar features to KM001 and same PC Software.

Power-Z KM001C

The main issue of Power-Z devices is no good English translation for both firmware and PC Software, But anyway it still a useful tool. And PC Software is actually best in class. Software updates are available at dropbox folder. Firmware update available from PC Software.

Power-Z KM001C Back
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Categories
air quality

D9 Air Quality Detector

This time OCRKJ D9-H. Which also can be found in some shops as unbranded LCD Digital Air Quality Monitor (AKA monllac, AgoHike, Robincure). Similar to OCRKJ K6-D from the previous review. It was bought for about 100$. Yet another portable device with 10 hours battery life and correct CO2 measurements.

D9 Air Quality detector

Pros

  • 3000 mAh battery ( 10 hours of battery life)
  • additional sensors (HCHO, VOC and PM2.5)
  • 16 different screens including trends
  • Active airflow with the relatively quiet fan
  • quality design and schematic inside (no glues, connectors, replaceable sensors)
  • good CO2 sensor inside – SenseAir S8 LP

Cons

  • slow charging – 8 hours (in operation mode)
  • no connectivity (Bluetooth, wi-fi, USB mass storage)
  • no ambient light sensor
  • unconfigurable high CO2 limits (GOOD is up to 1000 ppm)
  • wrong temperature and RH measurements (+3C, -10%RH)

It looks like relatively cheap SHT20 temperature and humidity sensor inside make it sort of a lottery if you will get correct measurements or not.

See device insides: https://wiki.liutyi.info/display/CO2/D9+Inside

SALE Price was: 102$

Categories
air quality

K6 Air Quality Detector

I was not expecting much ordering KKMOON K6 (and receiving actually OCRKJ K6). Which also known as CAFU K6. Because most of the portable air quality monitors I got before have at least one major issue with measurements (AiRead M3 – all measurements wrong, HT-501 – wrong temperature, AirRadio A6 – issues with CO2 measurement after outdoor use and wrong humidity measurements). AirVisual Node was the only exception that both portable and show correct numbers. But it just too big to put it in your pocket. So there was a long history of portable CO2 monitors with issues. And it was kind of a surprise that device I bought for 83$ is both portable and display correct numbers.

OCRKJ K6 Air Quality Detector

Pros

  • 3000 mAh battery ( 10 hours of battery life)
  • additional sensors (VOC and HCHO, PM2.5)
  • correct t, RH and CO2 measurements (not sure about other)
  • 16 different screens including trends
  • Active airflow with the relatively quiet fan
  • quality design and schematic inside (no glues, connectors, replaceable sensors)
  • good CO2 sensor inside – SenseAir S8 LP

Cons

  • slow charging – 8 hours (in operation mode)
  • no connectivity (Bluetooth, wi-fi, USB mass storage) – nothing
  • no ambient light sensor
  • unconfigurable high CO2 limits (GOOD is up to 1000 ppm)

See device insides: https://wiki.liutyi.info/display/CO2/K6+Inside

SALE Price was: 83$

Categories
power bank

Tqka Power Bank 10000 mAh

In the future fast charging might get some common ports and protocols. And it seems it will be type-c with USB Power Delivery in use in most cases. But for the moment it is several standards that provide more power than a standard USB port. Those standards are mostly not part of USB specification. And it is kind of unusual to have charger or power bank that support multiple fast charge protocols for different devices. That cause slower charging of some phones using charger or power bank designed for another. For example, at the moment most Qualcomm and Mediatek based Android smartphones have different fast charging standards. It took some time for me to find MTK-PE+QC3.0+Apple2.4 charger and power bank.

So the power bank is Tqka BA058

List of supported protocols

  1. Qualcomm Quick Charge 2.0 (QC2.0)
  2. Qualcomm Quick Charge 3.0 (QC3.0)
  3. Mediatek Pump Express 1.0 (MTK-PE)
  4. Mediatek Pump Express 2.0 (MTK-PE2.0)
  5. Huawei Fast Charge Protocol (FCP)
  6. Samsung Adaptive Fast Charging (AFC)
  7. USB Battery Charging 1.2 (BC2.1)
  8. Apple 2.4A
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Categories
air quality

Awair 2

Awair 2-nd edition is a better version of Awair, that fix some known issues of first edition

Awair 2
Awair 2-nd edition

What was fixed and added

  • 24h time format
  • USB Type-C standard 5v power connector
  • USB 5v 2A standard power supply
  • Better display (resolution, no backlight)
  • Ambient light sensor (display auto brightness)
  • Microphone (not sure if it is good to have it on IoT device)
  • Better PM2.5 sensor
  • New buttons to switch the display mode
  • Better wireless connectivity (new antennas)
  • Better (active) airflow
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